civilizations

The United Nations today honoured Nobel laureate, Rabindranath Tagore, whose collection of poetry, Gitanjali, and its universal message of harmony are the focus of an event at the Headquarters in New York aimed at promoting mutual respect and cross-cultural understanding.

The United Nations-backed Alliance of Civilizations this year will strengthen its role through mediation and fostering of cultural understanding, including sports, arts and music, the head of the initiative said today, outlining his priorities for the year.

Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon today stressed the need for tolerance and cooperation amidst the global economic crisis and the political transitions taking place in several Arab countries, and called on countries to strengthen their partnerships and engage in dialogue.

The Secretary-General's High Representative for the Alliance of Civilizations, Jorge Sampaio, today urged the world to honestly confront the problem of intolerance and extremism in the face of recent manifestations of bigotry, saying the vice cannot be overlooked, while silence can be seen as consent.

Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon today spoke out against the use of language and actions that cause divisions and distrust between people, stressing that dialogue was the best way to bridge cultural misunderstanding and create harmony between communities.

Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon today stressed that as the deepening global economic recession tears the fabric of societies by throwing a growing number of people out of work, the need for cross-cultural tolerance, dialogue, respect and understanding has never been greater.

The United Nations campaign for understanding between faiths and cultures, known as the Alliance of Civilizations, today launched a website designed to foster dialogue and debate on media literacy.

Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon will head to Spain next week for the first United Nations Alliance of Civilizations Forum aimed at promoting the global campaign launched by the world body to help overcome prejudices between nations and cultures and to promote interfaith dialogue.

In the face of increasing intercultural and inter-religious tensions, it is necessary to remember that diversity is not a threat, but a virtue, United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon told a gathering of scholars in Beijing today.

Promoting tolerance is a vital part of tackling many of today's global challenges which, though mostly political in nature, are aggravated and rendered intractable by the distrust, and even hostility, among different cultural and religious groups, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon told a high-level gathering on bridging the divide between Islam and the West.